by Peter David
“Thank you, lady,” he said, and bowed to her.
She pulled a crushed beer can from the hem of her dress and said two words in a musical voice that would have shamed the Siryns of myth.
“Never … again.”
And with that the Lady of the Lake turned and trudged slowly back as the roiling waters reached out to receive her.
Carefully Arthur examined his sword. They were two old friends, reunited at last. It gleamed in his hand, happy to see him. In many respects, he had felt naked without it. Now he felt ready to take on the world. Suddenly all the doubts, the confusions about the woman he had met, the wistful missing of those centuries agone ... all of them fell away as the only thing that remained pure and unsullied from that majestic time sang gently to him as he whipped it through the air.
He stepped over to a large, dead tree and swung at a low branch. The branch was as thick as the arms of two men, but the glowing sword passed through it without so much as slowing down, giving off a low hum like a swarm of powerful bees. Apparently startled that it could so easily be severed, the branch hung there for a moment before thudding to the ground.
Arthur heard the rustling behind him and he spun. Automatically he grabbed the hilt with both hands, holding the sword Excalibur in such a manner as to be both offensive and defensive. His eyes glittered in the dimness. “Who?” he called out. “Who is there?”
But he knew the answer even before they stumbled forward. In the wonderment of it all he had completely forgotten about his two would-be assailants. He was fortunate, he realized, that they were as incompetent as they were. Had they been even mildly formidable, he would have left himself foolishly vulnerable. As it was, they stumbled out with eyes like saucers. One of them, taller with blue eyes, came right to Arthur’s feet and then, to the returned king’s surprise, the scruffy skulker dropped to one knee. His companion looked down at him curiously. Without returning the glance the taller one reached to his partner’s pants leg and pulled him down also. His knees crunched slightly as he hit the ground.
Arthur lowered Excalibur, holding the pommel with one hand and letting the blade rest in his palm. “May I help you?”
“I’m ...” He could barely speak, his voice barely above a hoarse whisper. “I’m Buddy … this is Elvis … and … and we swear …”he said fervently.
This came as no surprise to Arthur, but he waited with polite curiosity to see if that was the end of the pronouncement. It wasn’t.
“We swear our undying allegiance to the man with the Day-Glo sword and the submersible girlfriend.”
King Arthur gave a little nod of his head. “Thank you. That’s very kind.” There was a long pause, and then Arthur said, “Is that it?”
Buddy looked up at him as if Arthur were a drooling idiot. “We’re waiting for you to knight us.”
Arthur suppressed a cough. “When hell freezes over,” he said.
Buddy gave this some thought. Finally he nodded. “All right,” he said agreeably. “We’ll wait. Won’t we?” He nudged Elvis in the ribs.
Elvis stared at him forlornly. “My feet are cold,” he sniffled.
They left the park together, their feet crunching on the gravel of the path.
It’s not the Round Table, thought Arthur, but it’s a start.
CHAPTRE
THE FOURTH
GWEN STEPPED OUT of the shower, now refreshed and prepared to face the new day that was shining so nauseatingly through the bathroom window. It was the bathroom’s only source of illumination, the fluorescents having burnt out some time ago. There had been no money to buy new ones.
She ran the towel over her slim body, rubbing it briskly across her back. Here in the womb-like security of the bathroom, the day didn’t seem quite so bad. She had just done the shower breast examination that she always dreaded, and was pleased to have found no lump in evidence. So she had her health, knock wood. And even better, she had a job interview this morning. And she could only think that it was going to go better than the disaster of the previous week. As if ignominiously losing out on the job wasn’t bad enough, to be pursued by some lunatic dressed as a knight? What the hell had been up with that?
And yet … there had been something about that moment that had seemed … right.
She shook it off. This was absolutely no time to allow herself to fall prey to yet another bout of romantic nonsense. She instead had to keep focus on what was important, and give no consideration at all to daydreaming.
She wrapped the light blue terry cloth towel around her body, and another towel around her strawberry blonde hair. She kept it short and manageable enough that drying it took only a few minutes. She was not one for wasting a lot of time on external frivolities. Gwen wrinkled her nose at herself in the mirror. She hated her face because it was perfect. The nose was just right. The eyes were just the right space apart, the eyebrows just the right thickness. Her cheekbones were not too high or defined. Her skin displayed no mars or blemishes. She was, on the whole, very attractive, as far as most people were concerned. But she did not agree. She longed for some distinguishing feature to give her face the character she felt it lacked. All the truly elegant women, she believed, had some feature you could hang a description on. A majestic profile caused by highly arched eyebrows, or a nose that was a tad too long—that was what she wanted.
She had even gone to a plastic surgeon once. He had laughed at her. Laughed! He told her that his patients would kill for looks like hers. He’d advised against unnecessary surgery and told her to go home for a week or so and think it over. She had never gotten the nerve to go back.
Gwen padded quietly into the living room, which doubled as an office. She found him—her boyfriend—as she knew she would. He was slumped over his computer, his head resting comfortably on the keyboard. She scowled as she saw row after row of gibberish letters scrolling across the screen. God only knew how long it had been doing that. She slid the keyboard out from under his face, and his head thumped to the tabletop. She ran her fingers through his greasy black hair and whispered, “Hon? Honey, go to bed. You really should go to bed.”
He grunted as he stood, balancing himself against the table. His eyes did not open as she took him firmly by the shoulder and steered him toward the bed. He passed an open window and snarled, and she noticed with distress that he was developing a most unhealthy pallor. It was beginning to feel like she was living with a vampire … which made sense. He never went outdoors, at least in daylight, and he was sucking her dry …
Stop thinking like that. You can’t lose faith in him. Not you. You’re all he has.
“Hon, have you considered trying to get outside a bit more?” she said carefully.
She was treading on tricky ground—the last time she’d broached such a subject, he had construed it as a criticism of him, and worse, an implication that he should get a job. “How can I get a job?” he’d screamed at the time. “I have my work!” He had then gone into a silent tantrum that lasted three days. It had been three very peaceful days for her.
This time he barely uttered a reply before collapsing onto the couch. It wasn’t the bed, but she decided to leave him there. It wasn’t worth the aggravation somehow, and besides, she had to get to the interview. She had to get the job. She just had to. If for no other reason than the fact that, within two days, the employment agencies would no longer be able to get in touch with her. The phone company would be disconnecting the phone.
She let the towel drop to the ground as she looked at the small assortment of clothes that hung in her closet. She heard a stirring in the living room and for one moment fantasized that he was waking up. That he would come into the room, see her standing there as she was, naked, her hair wet, and her body slim and supple. That he would take her in his arms and make wild, intense love to her. Despite the fact that she had to get to the job, she would welcome that kind of spontaneous, wildly romantic lovemaking in her life. It would be a nice change of pace.
He snorted and turne
d over on the couch.
She hoped against hope there would be further noise, but there wasn’t. So she allowed herself the luxury of sitting down on the threadbare bedspread and sobbing for five minutes. Then she dressed quickly and quietly, went back into the bathroom, washed the tears from her face as best she could and let herself out of the apartment. The soft click of the door roused the man sleeping on the couch only briefly.
GWEN LOOKED UP at the small office building on Twenty-eighth and Broadway. The words “Camelot Building” were stenciled in fading gilt letters on the glass above the entrance. An ironic name, she thought, for Camelot was a place of pageantry and legend. This somewhat rundown building was hardly that. It was, in every way, unremarkable. Then again, she thought, so was she. She immediately chided herself for taking such a defeatist view. It was exactly the kind of thing her therapist had warned her against, back when she could afford a therapist. She took a deep breath to steady herself, tried for the hundredth time to get herself pumped up for the meeting while simultaneously not magnifying its importance out of all proportion, and then entered the main lobby.
The guard at the front desk had to be at least sixty and didn’t seem especially capable of guarding anyone from anything unless it was a threat that was moving very, very slowly. He glanced up at her. “Can I help you, miss?”
She had been looking at the directory on the wall, and turned to him now. “Yes. I’m trying to find the offices of a Mr. Arthur Penn.”
He looked blank for a moment, and she felt her hopes sink. She wasn’t even going to get out of the starting gate on this one. This whole thing had been some sort of confusion or wild goose chase. She was beginning to wonder if she was her own worst enemy, her inability to get a decent job sabotaged by her own ineptness. But then his face cleared and he said, “Right. New fella. Thirteenth floor.”
She looked at him askance. “I thought buildings didn’t have thirteenth floors.”
The guard shrugged. “Fellow who built this place wasn’t a superstitious sort.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah. And he was a lucky fella too. He was fortunate enough to see his work completed.” He coughed. “Day after, he got hit by a truck. You can go on up.”
“Gee, thanks.” How comforting to know that, just when she thought she couldn’t feel worse … she could.
He chucked a thumb toward a far door and said, “Main elevator’s out. Better use the freight ’round back.”
She headed down the hallway, departing the tiled floor and entering a back hall with cement flooring and a strip of green carpeting down the center that had enough holes in it to sink the Titanic. The corridor light was dodgy at best, flickering slightly and making her worry that within moments she was going to be plunged into darkness. But the lightbulb managed to keep its diminishing life sustained for a short time longer, and she made it to the freight elevator. She’d hoped there would be an elevator operator, but it was self-service. The elevator car itself was a rickety affair that moved up the shaft with a maximum of screeching and clanking. She felt out of place, neatly pressed and dressed, wearing high-heel shoes and trapped in a huge elevator with metal walls and floor. A dying bulb lit the elevator, and she felt as if she were being carted up to her execution. Then this bulb, unlike its brothers in the hallway, gave out, and it became so dark in the elevator that she literally could not see her hand in front of her.
“How nice. A little preview of death,” she muttered, as much to keep up her flagging spirits as anything else.
She had never been so grateful for anything as when the doors opened on the thirteenth floor. She stepped out and the elevator bounced up and down like a yo-yo. As the doors closed behind her with a thud like a guillotine blade descending, she walked out into the main corridor. What she saw astounded her.
The offices of Arthur Penn were beautifully put together, but far from modern. All the furniture was antique; solid, dependable pieces everywhere she looked. The walls were paneled in knotty pine. The carpeting was deep plush in royal blue. Her breath was taken by the extreme contrast between this office and the rest of the building. It was almost as if one of them—the building or the offices—was in the wrong place. She started to wander about until a firm voice called her up short, saying, “Can I help you?”
She looked around and saw a fierce-looking receptionist seated at a desk, and she wondered how she had missed the woman the first time. She had the demeanor of a pitbull and, unlike the guard downstairs, seemed perfectly capable of wrestling intruders to the floor and tearing out their throats with her teeth. And enjoying it.
“Oh, yes, I’m sorry. I have an appointment. An appointment with Mr. Penn.”
The receptionist glanced down at a calendar on the edge of her uncluttered desk and asked, “You’re Gwen?”
Gwen nodded.
The receptionist seemed slightly mollified by the fact that this person was supposed to be here, but still looked like she regretted not having an opportunity to give someone the heave-ho. She said, “Very well. Take a seat, please. Mr. Penn will be with you shortly.”
Gwen nodded her thanks, sat in an ornately carved chair and looked down at a coffee table next to her, on which several recent news magazines rested. She started to reach for one but then paused and asked, “Would you like me to fill out a form or something?”
“No. That won’t be necessary.” The receptionist didn’t even bother to glance at her. Instead she had returned to staring resolutely ahead, like a griffin or some other mythical creature waiting for some intruder to try and breach the doors.
Why the hell had she thought of such a thing? Mythical beasts? Why had her mind wandered in that direction, of all things?
Still feeling confused as to her status, Gwen asked, “But how will the people in personnel know anything about me?”
The receptionist slowly swiveled her head back toward Gwen and focused on her, like an irritated snake studying an especially annoying bird. “We don’t have a personnel department,” she said deliberately, as if addressing an imbecile. “Mr. Penn himself will see you and decide either yes or no. All right?”
“Yes. All right,” said Gwen, feeling completely cowed.
“Any more questions?” she asked in the tone of someone who didn’t want to hear any.
“No, ma’am.”
The receptionist went back to watching. What appeared to be an unspeakably long time passed, and finally Gwen ventured in a small voice, “Nice weather we’re having, isn’t it?”
She’d barely gotten the words out when thunder rumbled from outside and rain smacked in huge droplets against the single office window. Gwen glanced heavenward.
“He will see you now,” said the receptionist abruptly. She was still looking away. What the hell was she watching for?
“Who will?” said Gwen, but quickly recovered. She stood and said, “Well, thank you. Thank you very much.” She smoothed her denim skirt. “You’ve been very kind.”
“No, I haven’t,” was the tart response. “I’ve treated you like garbage.”
“I beg your—”
Now the receptionist had once again focused her attention on Gwen. She spoke briskly and incisively, dissecting Gwen as if her words were scalpels. “You let people walk over you, dear, you’ll never get anywhere.” She stabbed a finger at Gwen. “Your personal relationships have the success rate of buggy-whip manufacturers, right?”
Gwen drew herself up to her full height. “Now I don’t think that’s any of your—”
“You don’t think? Hmph. I bet.” The woman chucked a thumb at a closed office door, and it was only then that Gwen noticed what incredible green eyes she had. “Go in. He’s expecting you. And for pity’s sake, don’t let yourself be used as a doormat. You’ve got too pretty a face to let it be filled with shoe prints.” And with that she went back to watching the front entrance.
Silently Gwen walked past her, completely confused. She went right up to the door, then swung about on her he
el to face the receptionist.
There was no one there.
Gwen’s eyebrows knit in confusion. She walked back to the desk, looked around. Nothing. Under the desk was nothing. But the receptionist hadn’t gone out the door—it had creaked horrendously when Gwen had entered; she would have heard an exit. Out of curiosity she rested a hand on the cushion of the seat behind the desk. It was cool, as if no one had been sitting there all day.
“Ooookaydokay,” she said finally, went quickly to the office door that the receptionist had indicated, and swung it open.
She was a little surprised to see a bearded man deep in discussion with a boy who looked to be about eight years old. They were speaking in low, intense tones, and it was quite clear to Gwen that there was none of the typical adult condescension in the man as he argued with the boy. Not the slightest. Apparently this Arthur Penn, if that was who this in fact happened to be, treated everyone as an equal.
Either that or he had a thing for little boys. This naturally set off alarm bells in Gwen’s head, but she didn’t want to rush to judgment. Still, she promised herself that she’d keep a wary eye on him, and if there was even the slightest sign of any impropriety, not only would she be out of there but she’d make personally sure that the police were brought in.
The most curious thing she heard was the scolding tone of the young boy. “The main thing you have to do differently this time around is think things through! That was always your greatest failing, thinking.”
“I’ve had plenty of time to dwell on mistakes ...”
“Plenty of time may not be enough time. You have to promise me that you’re not going to be impetuous. That you’ll make calm, considered decisions, rather than impulsive notions from your gut.”
“Such decisions come from my heart, Merlin, wherein all true knowledge lies—”
“Oh, bollux! The heart is nothing but a glorified water pump, with about as much knowledge as a sofa cushion ... or for that matter, your gut. The only thing of use to you is your brain, Arthur, your brain!”